Another Oil Derailment/Fire

[Anderson]

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/analysis-alabama-flames-fade-oil-063750636.html

Summary: Another oil-by-rail train went boom on a shortline, this time in Alabama. Virtually all of the comedy of errors that MMA committed were absent (two-man crew in use, speed not an issue, not using DOT-111s), so it's looking like it may have been a track condition derailment. On the bright side, nobody was killed or injured as far as I can tell.

This seems likely to shine a (bad) light on short line operators' upkeep practices, which appear to have been dubious. Ideally, this would put pressure on them to keep their lines up to better conditions, at least when hauling hazardous materials, but in a lot of cases they weren't expecting the oil-by-rail boom (which is slowly turning into an unfortunate turn of phrase).

 

[afigg]

Railway Age article on the derailment:Alabama & Gulf Coast Railway CBR train derails, explodes. The Reuters article in the yahoo link covers the accident and questions that are arising about the safety of transporting Bakken light crude pretty well. The FRA may have to mandate that Bakken crude be shipped in the newer DOT-111 compliant tank cars over the objections of the railroads. Or the insurance companies may begin to require the newer tank cars.

I may have missed it, but I did not see anything about this accident in the national news coverage. Guess it was because no one was killed and there are a lot of other major news stories competing for attention, but still this accident and fire should have gotten some attention.

Edit: left out the "not"

 

[Anderson]

This may be a variant on "If it bleeds, it leads": If nobody gets hurt, nobody cares.

 

[George Harris]

The FRA has some very detailed requirements for track inspection and maintenance. It appears that these were being followed. There is no justification at this time to claim "dubious" upkeep of the track or anything else.

As said in the news article, the cause of the derailment is buried under the wreckage. It may well also be destroyed in the fire, so this one may not have a satisfactory answer that can be found and then paraded through the media.

This line was the Frisco's line to Pensacola FL. Amory MS is the junction with the Memphis - Birmingham main. Several years after the BN takeover of the Frisco this line was sold off. It was always a fairly respectable secondary main, and in fact for a while had a 49 mph speed limit at least a far down as the junction off it of the Mobile line.

 

[xyzzy]

Current speed limit on the track in question is 40 mph. This is FRA Class 3. It may indeed turn out to be a track fault, but it may also turn out to be a broken wheel or other equipment fault. Don't jump to the conclusion that just because this track is now owned by G&W, the track maintenance is crappy.

 

[George Harris]

Current speed limit on the track in question is 40 mph. This is FRA Class 3. It may indeed turn out to be a track fault, but it may also turn out to be a broken wheel or other equipment fault. Don't jump to the conclusion that just because this track is now owned by G&W, the track maintenance is crappy.

Agree totally. Would be interesting to see if there may have been some issue with the bridge. However, wood trestles perform much better than a lot of people give them credit for, which gets us back to equipment issues.